It is too soon for human space flight. Everything should be done with robots for now. Everything on the moon can be done radio-controlled, almost real-time.

Esa is doing it well, a scientific interested agency that can link different states under the EU flag to seed a common politic interest

Under the sarkozy view, ESA will like an agency under the different politic interests/pressures from the goverments on turn, at the end it will breake the ESA hegemony, and will turn in a french agency or into a french vs britts vs germans vs the rest mess in the best case

Agree that ESA needs a new policy, but it should come from the *ESA itself* .Polititians should be a tool for the ESA, but ESA should not be a tool for polititians

Are we saying that space research should be politically motivated rather than scientifically motivated? Is this strictly a funding issue (more money from the government) or is it also an ideological issue (to push a specific agenda, which may or may not be in line with a scientific attitude)?

If the question is whether politics and ideologies of whoever happens to be in power should be made of paramount importance over actual science, I'd have to disagree. Science shouldn't be the tool of politicians, used to promote a specific agenda of their choosing. I'm not saying they shouldn't have a say in the process, just that science should not become a "political" field, usable to push propaganda or an ideology.

It's a potentially dangerous precedent to give politicians more power than they already have to either promote or quash ideas.

The global warming debate has become a bit farcical, more about politics than actual science. Anyone questioning the official doctrine is branded a heretic and ridiculed to some degree. When ideologies become involved, the "science" of the thing can go out the window.

I guess I'd say that politicians can suggest ideas or directions for future research, but the actual science decisions should still be separate from the politics, with scientists ultimately deciding what is / isn't good science, or a good proposition for the next direction of research.

If you anti-nationalists don't like this approach, suffer.

I'd prefer both, but if this is a choice, science wins.

But perhaps integrating ESA more in the EU can help cultivate a bit more public enthutiasm for the Union.

I totally agree GuLi, I can already see Kaczynski demanding that it's got to be a Polish citizen who's first to step on the moon of all European nations. I hate nationalists.

Really, I like the way ESA is only guided by scientific priorities right now. Just take the Terrestrial Planet Finder which NASA cancelled. ESA's Darwin mission is still going strong, because we don't have a moon programme to fund.

Another concern is it could well be yet another step towards public funded but private industries-driven scientific programs. I don't want to fund _their_ short-term, profit oriented research, any more.

Still, if it could mean a little more ambition and lots more money – one can only hope at this stage.

Oh, and while "astronaute" and "cosmonaute" both exist in French, a French astronaut is actually called a "spationaute".

Thanks for your collective work, UT is a great site.

That is true – politics has motivated the majority of technological leaps in space-faring (not to mention providing the overwhelming motivation for those initial steps into space).

The thing is, the ESA just seems to pick excellent bang-for-the-buck missions with fantastic science return for an eighth of the price – they punch above their weight in almost every mission they approve! Now I'm not saying that NASA doesn't achieve these things too – merely that, for poor old NASA, funding and funding decisions seem to change every year purely on political whimsy, which seriously hurts the agency.

Maybe you're correct, and a bit of political motivation thrown into the mix may be healthy for the agency and its goals. Lets hope so!

I think I feel a big political article coming on…. erm, well maybe I'll leave that for a weekend….

Cheers, Ian

Sacre bleu!